<$BlogRSDURL$>

 

Preposterous Universe

Monday, September 20, 2004
 
Provando E Riprovando

Leave it to Umberto Eco to draw together the recurring themes of the humble blog before you. From Arts and Letters Daily, a link to a rumination by Eco on Stephen Hawking's recantation of his previous stance that black hole evaporation destroys information. Eco uses the occasion of Hawking's flip-flop to draw a distinction between science and idealistic philosophy. (Thanks to Norman Graf for the last link.)

It's a distinction well worth drawing. One of the reasons why it's hard to define "science" is that the nature of scientific theories keeps changing, with concurrent debates about what really counts as scientific (e.g., whether entities we can never in principle observe should be part of a respectable scientific theory). But the distinguishing feature of science is not the theories it produces, but the methodology it uses for getting there. Eco labels the crucial feature of this methodology "provando e riprovando," Italian for "try and try again." That is to say, we propose all sorts of ideas, not because we have convinced ourselves that they are right, but because we don't know what is right and we're searching through all of the possibilities. Ultimately, agreement with the data will be the deciding factor, and often we can be very surprised at what kinds of theories come out on top (quantum mechanics being the most notable example.)

This strategy is something that non-scientists have trouble really believing in, even those who rub up against science every day. For example, I have been heavily involved in studying models of dark energy, or more broadly why the universe is accelerating. One idea that received some attention is the possibility that Einstein was wrong, and we have to modify gravity on cosmological scales. In talking to journalists, they would often ask me to explain why my theory was better than the alternatives. I had to explain that I didn't think it was better than the alternatives -- it was interesting and provocative, and it had a chance of being correct, but I didn't necessarily believe that it had a better chance than anything else. We don't only propose ideas we are convinced are right; we propose lots of things and let the chips fall where they may.

Even scientists and other academics don't always quite get the idea. I recall a talk given by an evolutionary psychologist, about the new center he was trying to found. The point of this center, according to his conception, was to demonstrate how important behaviors can find their explanations in the evolution of adaptive strategies. This is a terribly depressing mistake; the point of science is never to "demonstrate" anything, it's to sift through the interesting alternatives and decide which works the best, keeping an open mind at all times. (There is some art, to be sure, in deciding which alternatives are even worth our attention, and at what point a question can be considered to be satisfactorily settled.) If the "physics envy" felt in other disciplines were directed toward this kind of open-minded methodology, rather than to the impressively quantitative final products of physics, the world would be a better place.

It's not a coincidence, of course, that Eco also wrote the article on fascism that I commented about a sort while back. Nor is it a coincidence that scientists are especially riled up by the transgressions of the Bush administration (much more so than their general liberal tilt can explain). The distrust of indecision and ambiguity that is a hallmark of our current administration is an especially anti-scientific attitude. So you see, the science and politics posts here at Preposterous do share deep connections. Still no explanation for the posts about poker.

 
Ideas on culture, science, politics.
Sean Carroll


Preposterous Home
Atom Site Feed (xml)
RSS Feed
Technorati Profile
Bloglines Citations
Blogroll Me

Elsewhere
3quarksdaily
About Last Night
Alas, a Blog
The American Sector
apostropher
applecidercheesefudge
archy
Asymmetrical Information
Big Brass Blog
Bitch, Ph.D.
Blondesense
BlogBites
Body and Soul
Brad DeLong
Chris C Mooney
Collision Detection
Creek Running North
Crescat Sententia
Crooked Timber
Daily Kos
Daniel Drezner
Decembrist
Deepen the Mystery
Dispatches from the Culture Wars
Dynamics of Cats
Electron Blue
Eschaton
Explananda
Ezra Klein
Fafblog
Feministe
The Fulcrum
Girls Are Pretty
Grammar.police
Jacques Distler
James Wolcott
John and Belle
Julie Saltman
Lawyers, Guns and Money
Leiter Reports
locussolus
The Loom
Majikthise
Matt McIrvin
Matthew Yglesias
Michael Bérubé
Michael Nielsen
Mixing Memory
Mr. Sun
Not Even Wrong
Obsidian Wings
Orange Quark
Paige's Page
Pandagon
Panda's Thumb
Pharyngula
Playing School, Irreverently
Political Animal
The Poor Man
Quantum Diaries
Quark Soup
Real Climate
Rhosgobel
Roger Ailes
Rox Populi
Shakespeare's Sister
Simple Stories
Sisyphus Shrugged
Smijer & Buck
TPM Cafe
TigerHawk
uggabugga
Uncertain Principles
Unfogged
Volokh Conspiracy
Wonkette


Powered by Blogger
Comments by Haloscan
RSS Feed by 2RSS.com


Archives
February 2004
March 2004
April 2004
May 2004
June 2004
July 2004
August 2004
September 2004
October 2004
November 2004
December 2004
January 2005
February 2005
March 2005
April 2005
May 2005
June 2005
July 2005